about
The quick version…
Name's Emily, and I'm geeked out by history. Don't be fooled, the 'Vulcan' is a Roman mythological god and now historical figure adopted by my hometown of Birmingham, Alabama. Since my fair hometown has deep (and dark) historical roots, I pay homage to dear Vulcan through the namesake on the site (and strangely enough I share his torrid and tragic romantic life). The best way to describe me are six-fold: book junkie, political lefty, ungraceful (yet full of flair), ultra-organized (some call it OCD, I call them 'tendencies'), artsy, and scattered. Often a freelance designer by hobby or when the bank account starts looking grim (as well as other jobs to make the rent), I'm really an aspiring historian at heart looking for my next big deal. Dream jobs are currently either a presidential biographer or a rapper guy's girlfriend.
The longer version…
Jimmy Carter once said, “Wherever life takes us, there are moments of wonder.” The wonder of the life that I know has taken me to many places and paths, based solely on the fact that I never really knew what I wanted to do with my life. Sometimes, life can even take you into moments of assurance. My love in life is the world of history, especially that of the modern South and social history (Civil Rights Movement). And, life has brought me to the very moment of getting into it full-scale: graduate school. Never in my life would I have ever imagined that I would come to this chapter. In the initial years of my college career, I grumbled as I attended classes, choosing to sleep in more than study. Of course, my grades reflected such, with the exception of politics, art and art history, where my interest has never deterred. Either way, involvement in historical research of these areas has also initiated a deep concern for social justice and political equality, that I will probably fight until the day that I die. I did return to school, and graduated. It only took me a little longer than everyone else. I even had a semester of grad school, but my opportunity to move on to bigger and better things trumped it.
I left Alabama, where I have been all of my life, and moved to Washington, D.C. (or just a half-block outside it) in May 2006. I worked inside a political affairs division of a bi-partisan trade association, and tried to justify my move and aim for graduate school in the area. As fortune would have it, I returned to Birmingham in May 2007 to finish graduate school and to focus on urban history, and returned to the Capital City in July 2008. This time around, I resolved to live within the district to soak in the urban social culture of the fantastic neighborhood of Petworth, where I'm challenged each day to think outside the box from growing up in the suburban world of Alabama. While I do miss my dear Sweet Home Alabama and often criticize its dealing of history, it has its perks: the 'blue dots' that I've seen around the city keep me optimistic that maybe everyone will see the light… at some point.
